and the adventures that happen there

The Lazy Solution

There I was, at home after being gone for a glorious long weekend, and trying to finish a sewing project that is supposed to be a gift for a bridal shower in two days (no pressure, right?).

The project half sewn together when I needed to iron several parts in order to finish. I grab the iron, plug it in and wait for it to warm up. <crickets> It doesn’t warm up at all. Stone cold. Hmm. I turn it on and off about 19 times, put it on different settings, plug it into a different outlet all to no avail. Noooooooooooooooo. This particular iron is rather old, I bought it for $3 from a thrift store when my last iron stopped heating about a year ago. It has worked just fine since I bought it and lived up to it’s $3 price tag quite nicely. Well… until now, on this cold snowy day, when I have an urgent project to finish.

It was still snowing outside and having braved the roads home from work, I knew it wasn’t pretty. Not to mention cold and gross. And there’s that gift I need to finish tonight. I calculated driving to a nearby store, the fact that it would take a chunk out of my evening and I just did not want to go out.

I begin to wonder if a pancake griddle can work as a reverse iron. And then I notice a little screw on the bottom of the iron. Can’t hurt to open it up and have a look-see, right? I assume, of course, that I will just open it up, admit defeat, and put on my snow boots and head to the closest store that could sell me an iron…

Lucky for me, I never put my drill away, so it was within reach and seconds later I’ve removed the screw, pulled off the back of the iron and I’m staring at a singed electrical nut. Hmmm. Suspicious. I pull it off, grab my wire cutters, trim the end off a rather messy looking wire, put on a new wire nut, and replace the iron back and screw. 2 minutes (most of which was spent locating my wire nuts and wire cutters).

As I was screwing the iron back together I had to chuckle as I realized what I was actually doing. My dad and his dad have been known to take apart appliances for years to repair them. Spending far more time and energy than the appliance is worth in many cases. I have been made to poke fun at this very tendency. And yet there I was, doing exactly the same thing. It’s a family thing I guess.

After that two minute fix, I had a working iron again (which still feels rather miraculous) and was able to finish my sewing project, without a snowy trek to the store. And all in the name of extreme laziness and being unable to escape my last name.